Preparing for the 100 year life

I recently attended the wider launch of a piloted initiative called Envisage - a social enterprise that is helping individuals, businesses and the wider community harness the benefits of an ageing society and change the way Britain transitions into later life.

Envisage was birthed out of research on retirement transistions in 2015 - an initiative by Lord Wei and supported by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. Millions of people make significant life transitions every year in Britain e.g. retirement. Although many are planned and desired, for many people such transitions can often be traumatic, carrying often a high personal cost and stress as well as social and economic consequences for the state. The research highlighted the potential to create the equivalent of a 'National Retirement Service'. Major organisations e.g. Jaguar Land Rover have been working since then with The Shaftesbury Partnership to develop a pilot programme to help enable retirees to smooth, and take charge of, their transition to later life. The proven programme, now called Envisage, is ready to scale and help make a major difference for employers and employees.

The UK population is ageing. More of us are living longer than ever before and the proportion of the population aged 65 years and older is growing as the baby boomers age. Thanks to advances in medical science and rising living standards, many diseases which would have led to death or disability in the past, are now preventable or survivable. These profound demographic changes will not only affect us in years to come, but are already changing the way we live today. We ideally want to see growing numbers of people in later life who are happy, healthy, financially secure and able to contribute fully to society.

By 2040, nearly 1 in 7 people are expected to be aged over 75. This will have a profound impact on people of every age. We need to think about the pattern of our working lives including the potential to work for longer, retrain, or work more flexibly to suit our later lives. We need to manage our finances throughout life with foresight about our later lives. Pensions that were designed to last 10 years will need to last 20-30 years or be taken later. And, of course, we need to try and stay healthy and fit, find time for friends, think about where we’ll live; and how we’ll keep active and make a contribution. Such changes will also shape public services, such as health, social care, and transport, as well as the housing market and consumer goods and services.

By 2050, there will be an additional 8 million people aged between 50 and the state pension age. As our productivity and economic success become increasingly tied to that of older workers we must find ways to enable people to work for longer. Learning throughout our lifetimes will help us to participate for longer in the labour market, build personal and mental resilience and bring health and wellbeing benefits.

Envisage will help employers and employees to think afresh in many ways, such as:

Helping introduce measures such as flexible or part-time work that help an ageing workforce stay happy, health and motivated

Helping workforce planning which helps an ageing workforce enjoy the transition to post-work life